DOCSLIB.ORG

Sugar Goes Spelunking: an Engine to Build Your Own Text Adventure Avita Rutkin Union College - Schenectady, NY

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Sugar Goes Spelunking: an Engine to Build Your Own Text Adventure Avita Rutkin Union College - Schenectady, NY Union College Union | Digital Works Honors Theses Student Work 6-2012 Sugar Goes Spelunking: An Engine to Build Your Own Text Adventure Avita Rutkin Union College - Schenectady, NY Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalworks.union.edu/theses Part of the Neuroscience and Neurobiology Commons Recommended Citation Rutkin, Avita, "Sugar Goes Spelunking: An Engine to Build Your Own Text Adventure" (2012). Honors Theses. 891. https://digitalworks.union.edu/theses/891 This Open Access is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Work at Union | Digital Works. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of Union | Digital Works. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Sugar Goes Spelunking: An Engine to Build Your Own Text Adventure By Aviva Hope Rutkin ********* Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for Honors in the Department of Neuroscience UNION COLLEGE June 2012 2 ABSTRACT RUTKIN, AVIVA HOPE Sugar Goes Exploring: An Engine to Build Your Own Text Adventure. Department of Neuroscience, June 2012. ADVISOR: Kristina Striegnitz Computer games can be effective educational tools. Studies show that classroom computers increase students’ motivation to learn, promote collaboration among peers, and have the potential to improve classroom performance. Text adventures, a form of technological storytelling, particularly align with many of the qualities of successful learning games. To that end, I developed an activity for Sugar, One Laptop Per Child’s free and open-source desktop environment, in which children can create and play their own text adventures. My activity, Spelunk, will launch on Sugar in the spring of this year. 3 “When I played Zork, I felt like I was in that world, and the computer screen disappeared, and it was like I was reading a book, only even cooler than reading a book.” Paul O’Brian, interactive fiction author 4 1 Introduction 1.1 Classroom computers The idea of using computer games as educational tools is by no means new. The combination goes as far back as 1971’s Oregon Trail, and has been studied intensely by computer scientists, educators, psychologists, and media scholars alike. While some researchers were initially wary of computers’ potential for distraction, many have discovered a variety of benefits to technology into the classroom. First, computers increase students’ motivation to learn. They have been linked to higher levels of student engagement, better classroom discipline, higher attendance records, and increased self-reported interest in learning. There are positive effects for teachers as well; teachers who have computers in their classroom have an easier time planning and delivering lessons, and they make an active effort to include computers in instruction more often. [1][2] Computers have even been found to improve the attitudes of parents to their children’s classroom. [3] Second, computers promote collaboration between students. Some educational psychology theories, such as cognitivism and social development theory, argue that this is crucial for a good learning environment. Numerous studies show that computers do in fact lead to increased teamwork in the classroom, often indirectly encouraging students to work together in search of a solution. [3][4] Games are particularly effective in this regard. As psychologist Dr. Janette Hill elegantly states, Research into psychological and sociological benefits of play also revealed that games support intrinsic motivation as well as opportunities for imitation and learning by providing feedback, fantasy, and challenges. By creating virtual worlds, games integrate knowing and doing. Games bring together ways of knowing, ways of doing, 5 ways of being, and ways of caring: the situated understanding, effective social practices, powerful identities, and shared values that make someone an expert. When students work together, they help each other learn new skills and concepts more quickly. By doing so, they also take the pressure off of a potentially overwhelmed teacher in a crowded classroom. [5] Studies are divided over whether classroom computers have a definitively positive or merely a neutral impact in the classroom. However, the benefits that some research has unearthed are not insignificant; classroom computers have been linked to increased nonverbal IQ scores, enhanced reading skills, and improved memory performance. One study of thousands of American fourth graders and eighth graders concluded that computer use was positively correlated with academic achievement in mathematics and the social environment of the school. [1] Another assessment, a large-scale randomized evaluation of a laptop program in rural Peru, suggested that “the estimated impact [of laptop presence] on the verbal fluency measure represents the progression expected in six months for a child.” [6] While a few continue to question the strength of these connections, there is little research suggesting that the machines have an opposite, negative impact. The more likely explanation for the disparate conclusions is that there are effective and ineffective ways to integrate computers into the classroom. With respect to games, those that are simplistic, repetitive, or patronizing are usually found to be educationally unproductive. [7] In an influential paper published in 1980, video game design scholar Thomas Malone identified a number of key characteristics for success with computer games, including: An easily understood goal Uncertain outcome due to variable difficulty, multiple goals, hidden information, or randomness 6 Fantasy fulfillment Concrete feedback to the player A broad range of challenges [8] Meeting all of these requirements can, of course, be a formidable challenge, and they only go so far as to tell us how to make games engaging, not educational. Game designers must find a way to incorporate all of these characteristics and still more if they wish to find success with a particular endeavor. 1.2 Text adventures A text adventure is a computer game in which the player explores a virtual world through the written word. Forest Path This is a path winding through a dimly lit forest. The path heads north-south here. One particularly large tree with some low branches stands at the edge of the path. > go north Clearing You are in a clearing, with a forest surrounding you on all sides. A path leads south. On the ground is a pile of leaves. > kick leaves Kicking the pile of leaves isn’t notably helpful. > move leaves In disturbing the pile of leaves, a grating is revealed. > open grating The grating is locked. Figure 1. A sample exchange from ZORK I: The Great Underground Empire, released in 1981. [A] 7 Text adventures are a type of storytelling called interactive fiction; they require written action on the part of the player in order to move forward in the story. “The tensions at work in a cybertext, while not incompatible with those of narrative desire, are also something more, a struggle not merely for interpretive insight but also for narrative control: ‘I want this text to tell my story; the story that could not be without me,’” explains video game scholar Espen J. Aarseth. [9] The player exercises autonomy within the confines of the text adventure’s novelistic script by typing simple sentences such as ‘go east,’ ‘take lantern,’ and ‘kill thief.’ He or she must also solve a series of small logic puzzles scattered throughout to reach the end of the story and win the game. The first text adventure was, in fact, named Adventure. It was written in 1975 by a programmer named William Crowther as a detailed simulation of the Flint Mammoth Cave System in Edmonson, Kentucky. The game remained remarkably faithful to real-world geography, and included fantastical treasures as incentives for the player to continue exploring the caves. Although the game was originally intended only for his two young daughters, Crowther uploaded Adventure to the Internet precursor ARPANET, where it eventually piqued the curiosity of graduate student Don Woods. “I realized that it was unlike anything I had encountered up to that point,” Woods said. [10] He wrote to Crowther asking for permission to improve the original code; upon receiving it, Woods debugged the program, added a scoring system, and stocked the cave with additional magical elements. The resulting work, renamed Colossal Cave, gained more widespread popularity through ARPANET and the user group DECUS, and it is widely credited for kick starting a decade of impassioned text adventuring. 8 Pursuant text adventures run the gamut of styles, including labyrinthine games like the famous Zork series; whodunit mysteries such as Deadline, in which the player must apprehend a murderer; digitized walkthroughs of famous novels, both fanatically canonical and unexpectedly derivative; sexualized storylines like Leather Goddesses of Phobos, which can be played on several different ‘naughtiness’ levels; and unconventional moralistic tales, most notably A Mind Forever Voyaging.1 Games were occasionally sold with ‘feelies’—fake documents, evidence, or merchandise—which added an element of realism to the gaming experience. [11] The majority of text adventures were produced by Infocom, a software company founded by a group of MIT students in 1979. Infocom patterned their games off of the original Adventure epic, with an added emphasis on the need for problem solving. “Although our games are interactive fiction,” read one edition of the company newsletter, The New Zork Times, they’re more than just stories: they are also a series of puzzles. It is these puzzles that transform our text from an hour's worth of reading to many, many hours’ worth of thinking. It is these puzzles that cause a player to suddenly leap out of bed in the middle of the night and run to his computer because he just thought of a possible solution to a problem. The value of our games is that they will provide many hours of stimulating mental exercise. [12] Many puzzles require the player to experiment with language. For those who are playing without any guidance, this task can prove quite difficult.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • New Adventures Introduced At
    March, 1988 Vol. V, #3 $2.00 New Adventures Introduced at CES By Shay Addams Flu-stricken Tom Snyder and not-yet­ Blubbermen (Steve Meretzky), Gamma ctivision kicked off the first day of flu-stricken Peter Reynolds presented an Force in Pit of a Thousand Screams (Amy the Winter Consumer Electronics overview and example of lnfoComics. Briggs) and ZorkQuest: Assault on Egreth AShow in Las Vegas with a press ''We wanted to do something that Castle (Elizabeth Langosey)-feature conference where President Bruce Davis wouldn't be just for 14-year-old boys and comic book themes and will even be sold announced a deal with Telecomsoft to 35-year-old men," Snyder sneezed, "to in comic book and toy stores. Snyder's distribute all the Firebird and Rainbird create a kind of computer game that even company developed the concept and titles formerly handled by Firebird my mother would play." InfoComics will creates the graphics, and Infocom is Licensees. Davis also said Activision just have no puzzles or goals-by assuming a producing the programs, which are bought Triton, a direct-marketing firm, to different character's persona at key supposed to last four to five hours and sell launch direct mail sales (so start watching intersections of the plot, you change your for $12 suggested retail. InfoComics will that mail box). perspective rather than the story itself. be released for Apple, IBM/100% com­ Next, Infocom President Joel Berez patibles andC 64/128 in March. announced Infocom's "three-part strat­ "A French Film Director's Dream" . After the press conference, Sandy Ward egy," which is already in progress: Panning, zooming and other cinematic showed off Micro Illusions' Land of supporting existing adventure fans, with techniques are combined with "minimalist Legends on the Amiga.
    [Show full text]
  • Shaping Stories and Building Worlds on Interactive Fiction Platforms
    Shaping Stories and Building Worlds on Interactive Fiction Platforms The MIT Faculty has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters. Citation Mitchell, Alex, and Nick Monfort. "Shaping Stories and Building Worlds on Interactive Fiction Platforms." 2009 Digital Arts and Culture Conference (December 2009). As Published http://simonpenny.net/dac/day2.html Publisher Digital Arts and Culture Version Author's final manuscript Citable link http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/100288 Terms of Use Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use. Shaping Stories and Building Worlds on Interactive Fiction Platforms Alex Mitchell Nick Montfort Communications and New Media Programme Program in Writing & Humanistic Studies National University of Singapore Massachusetts Institute of Technology [email protected] [email protected] ABSTRACT simulates an intricate, systematic world full of robots, made of Adventure game development systems are platforms from the components and functioning together in curious ways. The world developer’s perspective. This paper investigates several subtle model acts in ways that are mechanical and nested, making the differences between these platforms, focusing on two systems for code’s class structure seemingly evident as one plays the game. In interactive fiction development. We consider how these platform contrast, Emily Short’s Savoir-Faire (2002), written in Inform 6 differences may have influenced authors as they developed and of similar complexity, exhibits less obvious inheritance and systems for simulation and storytelling. Through close readings of compartmentalization.
    [Show full text]
  • Creating Video Games for the Visually Impaired Anthony Russo, Neal
    Creating Video Games for the Visually Impaired Anthony Russo, Neal Sacks, & Steven Vandal WPI IQP MBJ 0007 Professor Brian Moriarty April 12, 2012 Introduction The video game industry has expanded rapidly in recent years, growing from a 9.5 billion dollar industry in 2007 to a 25.1 billion dollar industry in 2010. This growth is due to the common interest that almost all Americans now hold in games, as a seventy-two percent of all americans play video games on a regular basis (ESA). However, because games rely heavily on impressive graphics and are primarily an immersive visual experience, very few games are made with the blind or the visually impaired in mind. In the 1970s when video games first emerged, it was virtually impossible to create a game that did not involve some sort of visuals. This is mainly due to a lack of technology, as almost all computers, games, and electronic speakers and displays could only output crude, pixilated visuals and rough, synthesized sound. However, technology has steadily improved to the point where games that do not need visuals are a possibility. Games for the visually impaired are an untapped industry, especially with the technology that exists today. By conducting interviews with the visually impaired we discovered what types of games the visual impaired prefer, what they would enjoy to play, and what ideas they have for developing these games. The History of Video Games for the Visually Impaired There are many games that can be played by the visually impaired. Interactive fiction and other text-based games have been popular for a long time, though to a lesser extent in recent years.
    [Show full text]
  • The Best Websites for Downloading and Playing Classic and New Text Adventure Games
    The Best Websites for Downloading and Playing Classic and New Text Adventure Games Before computers could handle graphical games, there were text adventure games. The games are interactive stories, so playing a text adventure game is like being part of a book in which you affect the story. Text adventure games are also referred to as “interactive fiction.” Interactive Fiction (IF) is actually a more accurate term for text adventure games, because these games can cover any topics, such as romances or comedies, not just adventures. They can also simulate real life. Even though computers can now handle intensely graphical games, playing text adventure games can still be fun. It’s like reading a good book and getting lost in the universe of the story, except you become the hero or heroine and affect the ending of the story. We’ve collected some links to websites where you can download classic and new text adventure games or play them online. There are also some free tools available for creating your own text adventure games. We even found a documentary about the evolution of computer adventure games and some articles about the art and craft of developing the original text adventure games. Web-Adventures Web-Adventures[1] allows you to play classic text adventure games online for free in your browser. You don’t need to install any applets or plugins or enable JavaScript. You can even play some of these games in a browser on mobile devices. The very first text adventure game from the late 1970’s, Colossal Cave Adventure, is available on this site.
    [Show full text]
  • Ficções Interativas Entre a Literatura E a Computação
    Ficções interativas Entre a literatura e a computação Janos Biro Esta obra é livre e deve permanecer livre. Pode e deve ser reproduzida no todo ou em parte, além de ser liberada a sua distribuição. Este livreto foi escrito, impresso e montado de modo independente em Goiânia-GO com os recursos coletivos da Impressora Anarquista (@impanark) e está disponível em PDF gratuitamente. O mercado editorial é injusto, apoie produções independentes. Como citar este livro: LEITE, Janos B. M. Ficções interativas: Entre a literatura e a computação. Contrafatual, 2020. Contrafatual, 2020 contrafatual.com Ficções interativas: Entre a literatura e a computação Sumário Apresentação ............................................................................................ 4 O que são ficções interativas? .................................................................. 5 Exemplos de ficções interativas ............................................................... 7 Como jogar ficções interativas ............................................................... 10 Como criar ficções interativas ............................................................... 11 História das ficções interativas .............................................................. 14 Teoria das ficções interativas ................................................................. 21 Apresentação Sou atraído por livros e por computadores desde antes de aprender a escrever. É uma relação que mal consigo compreender. Descobri o mundo das ficções interativas em 1999, e antes disso tinha
    [Show full text]
  • T Uestbusters )J
    uestBusterS )j t --- The Adventurers' Journal Vol. V, #4 April, 1988 $2.00 Interplay Goes Independent! Best-known for the Bard's spend, say two years on a Interplay plans three to four also be their first to be initial­ Tale series, Interplay Produc­ Wasteland, and survive. titles a year, concentrating on ly released for the Amiga. tions has begun pqblishing its role-playing games and a few "It's not role-playing, but sort own software, to be distribut­ "But as a publisher we have a hybrid products. Fargo elabo- of a strategy game," Fargo ed exclusively by Activision. little more of a profit margin, rates: "Everything won't be hints. "Graphically it's a real so we can take on even more your standard role-playing showpiece." "We've been a developer for ambitious projects. To the game-roll up your characters 4 1(2 years," Interplay Presi- gamer, this means the quality and so on. Star Flight is a dent Brian Fargo explains, of our products will continue good example of a game that "and as our products have to grow-and now we can is role-playing but not your grown more and more refined, spend even more time on traditional kind of game. The we began to care about the them. We'll focus on Com- first role-playing game we'll whole process: marketing, modore, Apple and MS DOS, publish will beNeuromancer, advertising, packaging. An- and do some for the 68000 based on William Gibson's other reason is that our prod- machines and maybe even the science fiction novel about fu- Fargo at Winter CES ucts are getting more corn- PS 2-we'll take chances if turistic computer hackers." About the Bard plex and taking longer to do, we want to do something real- (June, C-64) But Interplay's so as a developer it's hard to ly different or avant garde." first independent title will "Electronic Arts owns the ------------------------------------ name," according to Fargo, "so we can't release another Bard's Tale.
    [Show full text]
  • Livre, Film Ou Monde Interactif ? Les Métaphores De La Construction Formelle Du Jeu D’Aventure Jonathan Lessard
    Document generated on 09/24/2021 8:34 p.m. Mémoires du livre Studies in Book Culture Livre, film ou monde interactif ? Les métaphores de la construction formelle du jeu d’aventure Jonathan Lessard Livre et jeu vidéo Article abstract Book and Videogame This article questions the role of the cultural references that guide creators in Volume 5, Number 2, Spring 2014 their exploration of new cultural forms that are still without an established aesthetic canon. The case study is the adventure game, a foundational genre of URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1024781ar computer games. Following the diffusion of the Adventure program in 1977, DOI: https://doi.org/10.7202/1024781ar this new form of digital game became a field of intense experimentation inspired by the promises of new computer technologies. A close historical reading of the games and of the discourse that surrounded them sheds light on See table of contents the processes by which creators’ cultural references guide their exploration of the genre and thus shape its evolution. This specific trajectory is presented as a product of three principle metaphors that permit the framing of the adventure Publisher(s) game genre and the projection of it into the future: the book, the film or the interactive world. Groupe de recherches et d’études sur le livre au Québec ISSN 1920-602X (digital) Explore this journal Cite this article Lessard, J. (2014). Livre, film ou monde interactif ? Les métaphores de la construction formelle du jeu d’aventure. Mémoires du livre / Studies in Book Culture, 5(2). https://doi.org/10.7202/1024781ar Tous droits réservés © Groupe de recherches et d’études sur le livre au Québec, This document is protected by copyright law.
    [Show full text]
  • Command Lines: Aesthetics and Technique in Interactive Fiction And
    Command Lines: 1 Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Command Lines: Aesthetics and Technique in Interactive Fiction and New Media a dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in English by Jeremy Douglass UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Santa Barbara Committee in charge: Professor Alan Liu, Chair Professor Rita Raley Jeremy Douglass 2 Professor William Warner December 2007 dedicated to my grandparents Charles and Norma Keller Enid and Malcolm Douglass your love made everything possible ABSTRACT Command Lines: Aesthetics and Technique in Interactive Fiction and New Media by Jeremy Douglass The Interactive Fiction (IF) genre describes text-based narrative experiences in which a person interacts with a computer simulation by typing text phrases (usually commands in the imperative mood) and reading software-generated text responses (usually statements in the second person present tense). Re-examining historical and contemporary IF illuminates the larger fields of electronic literature and game studies. Intertwined aesthetic and technical developments in IF from 1977 to the present are analyzed in terms of language (person, tense, and mood), narrative theory (Iser's gaps, the fabula / sjuzet distinction), game studies / ludology (player apprehension of rules, evaluation of strategic advancement), and filmic representation (subjective POV, time-loops). Two general methodological concepts for digital humanities analyses are developed in relation to IF: implied code, which facilitates studying the interactor's mental model of an interactive work; and frustration aesthetics, which facilitates analysis of the constraints that structure interactive experiences. IF works interpreted in extended "close interactions" include Plotkin's Shade (1999), Barlow's Aisle (2000), Pontious's Rematch (2000), Foster and Ravipinto's Slouching Towards Bedlam (2003), and others.
    [Show full text]
  • Teaching and Learning with Interactive Fiction
    Computers + Storytelling Teaching + Learning Teaching and Learning With Interactive Fiction Brendan Desilets Second Edition May 2015 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Copyright 2015 by Brendan Desilets Preface Are you one of those fed-up English teachers who can't wait for the standardized testing boom to go bust? While you're waiting, would you like to try a highly- motivational literary form that can help students to think more clearly, build their reading skills, and even enable them to write better? And, with all those improved skills, might you even hope to see those nasty test scores go up a bit? Or are you a university instructor, looking for a way to integrate science and the humanities, without abandoning either one? Meanwhile, would you like to explore a medium that comes with a broad array of sophisticated writing-process tools? Or are you simply interested in teaching and learning in the Information Age, without any social- media hype? If you're in any of these categories, this book may be for you. It introduces a form of computer-based literature called interactive fiction, and shows you how this form dovetails with the goals of most students, teachers, and parents. It shows you how to get started with this challenging form, and it provides lots of instances of the form, most of them free of charge. 2 What is Interactive Fiction? Interactive fiction, sometimes called text-adventure gaming or IF, is a form of narrative literature in which the reader plays the part of a character in a story.
    [Show full text]
  • Downloaded That and Worked with the Files Directly
    IQP DMO 4909 THE ORAL HISTORY OF VIDEO GAMES Interactive Qualifying Project Report completed in partial fulfillment of the Bachelor of Science degree at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA Submitted to: Professor Dean M. O’Donnell (advisor) Andrew Brockert Kristina Davenport Kyle Horn Matthew Ivory May 3rd, 2010 ___________________________ Advisor Signature This report represents the work of one or more WPI undergraduate students submitted to the faculty as evidence of completion of a degree requirement. WPI routinely publishes these reports on its web site without editorial or peer review. Abstract The purpose of the Oral History of Video Games IQP this year was to conduct and add our own interviews to this ongoing project as well as create a website to showcase everyone’s work. We watched various documentaries and learned filming and editing techniques from Jason Scott, a documentarian. We spent the second term conducting the actual interviews for the project. Finally, the last term was dedicated to editing the interviews and integrating the website. 1 Table of Contents Abstract _________________________________________________________________________ 1 Table of Contents __________________________________________________________________ 2 Acknowledgements ________________________________________________________________ 3 1. Introduction ____________________________________________________________________ 4 2. What We Did 2a. Learning the Process ____________________________________________________________ 6 2b. The Interview(s)
    [Show full text]
  • Shaping Stories and Building Worlds on Interactive Fiction Platforms
    Shaping Stories and Building Worlds on Interactive Fiction Platforms Alex Mitchell Nick Montfort Communications and New Media Programme Program in Writing & Humanistic Studies National University of Singapore Massachusetts Institute of Technology [email protected] [email protected] ABSTRACT simulates an intricate, systematic world full of robots, made of Adventure game development systems are platforms from the components and functioning together in curious ways. The world developer’s perspective. This paper investigates several subtle model acts in ways that are mechanical and nested, making the differences between these platforms, focusing on two systems for code’s class structure seemingly evident as one plays the game. In interactive fiction development. We consider how these platform contrast, Emily Short’s Savoir-Faire (2002), written in Inform 6 differences may have influenced authors as they developed and of similar complexity, exhibits less obvious inheritance and systems for simulation and storytelling. Through close readings of compartmentalization. This game offers the possibility of magical Dan Shiovitz’s Bad Machine (1998), written in TADS 2, and relationships between objects that have similar appearance, Emily Short’s Savoir-Faire (2002), written in Inform 6, we objects which can be linked by the player character. Inform 6 uses discuss how these two interactive fiction authoring systems may attributes and properties more heavily, and sub-classing less often, have influenced the structure of simulated story worlds that were to determine behaviour, an approach which relates to the type of built in them. We extend this comparative approach to larger sets similarity which governs the game’s magic system. We follow of games, looking at interactive wordplay and the presentation of this comparison with an extension to other games, comparing information within the story.
    [Show full text]
  • IQP DMO 3323 the ORAL HISTORY of VIDEO GAMES Interactive
    IQP DMO 3323 THE ORAL HISTORY OF VIDEO GAMES Interactive Qualifying Project Report Completed in Partial Fulfillment of the Bachelor of Science Degree at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA Submitted to: Professor Dean M. O’Donnell (adviser) Suzanne DelPrete Eyleen Graedler March 5, 2013 This report represents the work of one or more WPI undergraduate students submitted to the faculty as evidence of completion of a degree requirement. WPI routinely publishes these reports on its web site without editorial or peer review. 1 Abstract: We interviewed Andrew “Zarf” Plotkin and Stuart Galley to further expand the IGDA Game Preservation SIG1 and Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s Oral History of Video Games website2. Prior to the interviews with Plotkin and Galley, we conducted practice interviews on WPI students to ascertain the best way to conduct an interview. We also viewed documentaries to examine different ways in which professionals conducted good interviews and edited them to correctly to capture their essence. 1 IGDA preservation website <http://www.igda.org/preservation> 2 Oral History of Video Games Website <http://alpheus.wpi.edu/imgd/oral-history/> 2 Authorship Page: Suzanne DelPrete and Eyleen Graedler each had individual as well as group responsibilities in the completion of the IQP. As a group, we watched various documentaries to get a feel for how interviews are conducted. While researching subjects to interview, Suzanne wrote up the biography for Andrew Plotkin while Eyleen wrote up one for Stuart Galley. Suzanne DelPrete was the video editor and outreach person of this IQP. She contacted possible interviewees and worked with them to set up interview times and locations.
    [Show full text]